It has been 1 year and 7 months since the day I awakened.
The journey of the first 7 months you guys should already know. If you don't read the previous chapter.
I have spent the last 1 year training my ass off.
I trained in everything I could get my hands on. I already had most of the theoretical knowledge down, the only thing I needed to do now was practice. Even if I am a genius with a photographic memory, I believe in the power of practice more than my own genius.
The progress of my 'Magic Cultivation' has slowed down after the core sessions. My body has already become strong, strong enough to take a punch straight to the face from The Shadow Emperor, whose strength rivals the Original Satan, and come out with a broken nose, cracked skull, and a mild concussion. Oddly specific right?
Well anyway, Gramps qualifies that as being equal to the strength of a peak mid-class devil. I thought I would be higher on the spectrum by now, but it seems that in all that planning I forgot one crucial thing, my body of a child.
After I completed the core sessions of 'Magic Cultivation' I found a book called 'The Devil Anatomy' by Andreas Vesalius. The book was recently released and had quite extensive research on the body of devils. Most of the knowledge in the book I had already read from various sources, now long gone and forgotten, but the most interesting thing in the book was the study of the relation between magic and the devil's body.
It said and I quote, "The Devils are a magical race created by Lucifer Morningstar and birthed by Lilith, made solely to fight The God of Bible. The building blocks of a devil's body are magic. As time flows the bodies of the devil become stronger and tougher, this is due to the saturation of magic in cells."
"As devils grow older the cellular structure of their body becomes more rigid. This gives the race their 'forever young look'…"
It completely shattered me.
If you still don't understand what it means, I shall explain it in simple words.
If I do my Magic Cultivation I will be under the shota-con category of hentai for my Whole. Fucking. Life.
.
.
.
So yeah… That plan got fucked anal without consent.
.
.
.
Moving on.
With my instant power-up plan blown to smithereens, I decided to train my prowess in combat and magic.
I trained with Grandma in magic. This was honestly very interesting, because Devil's magic is more of a free kind of magic, unlike Angelic magic. Angel's magic is a rigid magic type, it's mostly making weapons from light and only the powerful seraphs can be more versatile with it. While the devil's magic is based more on desire, making it more versatile, but less powerful as the strength of the desire affects the power of the magic.
As for combat, Gramps was the one who tort… *cough* *cough* I mean taught me. He started by teaching me basic hand-to-hand combat styles, and then he started the real tort… I mean training, which is fighting me. He didn't just stop at that he also made Grayfia and the Malebranche fight me too. Which became my schedule for the last 12 months. Train in magic with Grandma in the morning and fight the others from then on until morning.
I didn't sleep for a whole year.
Which honestly, didn't bother me much as I had had enough sleep for the rest of my life.
***
Currently, I am walking casually in a forest with a smile on my face.
Suddenly I heard a faint rustling of leaves signifying some kind of monster trying to close up on me. I turned towards the direction of the noise and used my Shadow for attacking.
Tens of chains with a dagger at the tip came out of my shadow and floated around me, ready to make holes in anyone who dared to attack me. All of them were darkest of dark, completely devoid of light, making them look something surreal as if they were imaginary and real at the same time.
Believe it or not, my Shadow is sentient now.
It's not like a fully sentient being like humans, it's more like a small dog, with limited understanding, working more on instincts rather than thoughts. However, most of its instincts are just about protecting me. I can also control it making it pretty useful in One-vs-Many fights.
(It's like Doctor Octavius' mechanical arms but without the craziness).
My Shadow Powers have been mutating since the day I woke up, it was just a slow process due to me not using my powers more often.
But this process has speed-upped since I came to The Darklands to get experience in fighting real life and death battles without anyone protecting me.
I should probably explain what Darklands are. The Darklands is a small dimension created by my grandparents for young clan members to get experience in fighting and killing before they go out in the world.
The Darklands is filled with numerous monsters from all around the world. From slimes to hydra, different monsters from different legends and myths are inside the Darklands. The dimension has its own ecosystems making it a miniature world, perfect for the monsters to grow and multiply.
The Darklands is on a different time axis to the real world. The time in Darklands passes 2 times slower than in the real world. So, 6 months in the real world is 1 year in Darklands. The exact amount of time I have been in the Darklands.
Well, back to the current situation.
I waited for whatever was making the noise to come out. I was ready for the fight, with the Shadow Chains to protect me and the Star Flame in hand to attack.
'I hope it's a hydra.'
But what came out was Grayfia and Malacoda.
"What the heaven are you guys doing here?" I asked them obviously confused as I still had around 4 months before I had to leave.
"'I' have been tasked with bringing you outside, Master. As for the reasons, that will be explained by Lady and Lord De Vil." Malacoda answered my question while Grayfia looked at him with eyes that screamed murder.
"Uh…Okay…Just let me grab a few things from the treehouse." I answered.
Oh yeah, I built a treehouse. And I have to say it's just incredible.
***
Currently, the De Vils are inside a room watching some of the adventures of Aatrox Nephalem De Vil.
On-screen, Aatrox was fighting a tribe of giants, with a crazy maniac smile. He was jumping between the giants' bodies and annoying the hell out of them. He's using his Shadow powers to hold down the giants sometimes and sometimes skewering them through their feet, making absolute chaos on the battlefield, and then using projectiles of Star Flame to make numerous small fires on their bodies, testing out their intensity and power. All with a smile of a crazy mad scientist.
The scene then shifted to him fighting a hydra. However, rather than avoiding cutting the hydra's head, he was intentionally cutting them off. All with the same crazy mad scientist smile.
The scene shifted again, showing Aatrox fighting a stampede of monsters. This time he was using all his abilities, his Shadow, The Star Flame, Magic, and SMA (Shadow Martial Arts). He was fighting with all his abilities. This would usually seem like an unlucky individual fighting tooth and nail against an unexpected monster stampede. "USUALLY".
Your opinion would change when you see the expression on the face of the person in question. A big, toothy, crazy-ass smile that shows his enjoyment of the situation at hand.
And also learned that the person in question started the monster stampede. Yup, Aatrox Nephalem De Vil started a monster stampede just so that he could fight it head-on.
The scene changed again and again and again and again, showing various footage of Aatrox fighting monsters after monsters in the same way. Making absolute chaos on the battlefield all with a big crazy smile plastered on his face in all of them.
"Why am I watching myself fighting various monsters? Is this some sort of learning session to see what mistakes I made during the fight? When can I go back to the Darklands?" Aatrox asked his grandparents after pausing the footage of him fighting minotaurs.
"First of all, no this is not a learning session. Second of all, you are not going back to the Darklands." Skygge answered Aatrox's questions.
Aatrox was about to ask why, but his grandma answered the question before he could say anything.
"It's because you wiped out 27% of the whole monster population in the Darklands." said Adeline.
"If we let you continue any longer, the whole circle of life will be broken inside the Darklands." She added further.
Aatrox didn't ask anything further, as he knew the consequences of his actions and also because his Grandma was furious about his actions.
"Nepth, because of your actions, we will have to close the Darklands until the monster population in the Darklands stabilizes again." Skygge told his grandson the result of his actions calmly.
"Sorry. I should have been more thoughtful of my actions, I won't repeat the mistake in the future." Aatrox apologized to his grandparents. As he had not only caused a problem for them but had also caused a problem for his clan.
"… It's all right. Just remember to learn from this. Okay?" Skygge ruffled his grandson's hair and shut down further talks about the topic after Aatrox learned of his mistake.
Aatrox nodded to his Gramps in confirmation.
"… So… what now?" Aatrox asked.
"Now, you will practice your noble etiquettes." Adeline replied with a small smile.
Aatrox face instantly scrunched up, as learning noble etiquettes were not his favorite.
"Why??"
"Because it's time for the Young Devils meet and we don't want you to embarrass yourself. Also, you will be finally getting your Evil Pieces." Adeline answered with a smile that sent shivers down both grandson's and grandfather's spines.
(A/N: Next Chapter the Evil Pieces and after that meeting the Crimson Oppai Princess.)